In this episode of Sequence over Strategy, Michelle breaks down the most effective (and least cringeworthy) ways to get people to actually respond.
Tired of getting ghosted when reaching out to new connections? In this episode of Sequence over Strategy, Michelle breaks down the most effective (and least cringeworthy) ways to get people to actually respond. From leveraging mutual introductions and creating value-driven projects to sending thoughtful thank-you notes and mastering cold but purposeful outreach, you'll learn how to stand out in a noisy world. Ditch the generic messages and discover how to build relationships that actually stick!
Check out the full episode at TheMichelleWarner.com
Hi, I'm Michelle Warner and I'm a business designer and strategist. In the 15 years I've done this work I noticed the same trend everywhere. Business owners are falling into a trap of centering strategies first when they need to be centering sequence because the reality is the steps you take in your business and the order in which you take them is more important than how well you implement any single strategy.
So on this show my goal is to fix that by helping you find and trust your own sequence of actions rather than blindly follow someone else's strategy. Welcome to Sequence Over Strategy. And in every episode of this show I tackle a real question I'm hearing from real entrepreneurs and in this case there's a lot of entrepreneurs asking this.
Just in the last week I taught my Build Your Relationship Funnel Boot Camp and I also spoke to two really active and engaged groups of entrepreneurs and they all had the same question for me. And that question was, how do you meet people without getting ghosted? And of course there's a Sequence Over Strategy tilt to this but I had to laugh when I heard that question and not laugh out of making fun of anyone but just remembering how much and how important it is to cover the basics.
Because I talk all the time how to build relationships and I have a whole course called Networking That Pays that talks about all of this. But sometimes it's tough to get started if you can't even wrap your brain around how am I gonna meet someone in a productive way in order to build a collaborative relationship that results in referrals and results in business. And so today I'm gonna talk through how you kick off a relationship.
How do you meet people and specifically how do you meet people without getting ghosted? Because in today's business world you might think you have the best idea for a relationship or collaboration or maybe you're even reaching out to potential clients and attention spans are so low we're all so busy that you get ghosted all the time and it's really easy to feel burned. And so as I again as I teach a course called Networking That Pays as I advocate over the importance of relationships I realized that so many people are not even giving this a chance because they have this experience where they've just been ghosted and it doesn't feel worth it trying to try one more time.But it is.
So I want to talk you through this in a sequence over strategy framework to help you see how maybe some of the outreach you've done in the past wasn't as optimized as it could be. More importantly what you can just do in the future to make these introductions or outreach or whatever you're trying to do to connect with someone to make it be more effective for you. Because we can definitely think in an order of operations here in a sequence over strategy way and find some clues in that. Because again when most people are reaching out or when I get this question the most often they are thinking about it through an assumption that they are going to have to do cold outreach of some kind. So if they want to meet someone they are thinking how can I send the best cold outreach possible? And my answer is don't cold outreach.
We have so many other ways that you can meet folks and meet the best people. And if they're not thinking about how do I meet somebody and you know how do I do that effectively through cold outreaching they're thinking about why are all these people in my current network who I'm reaching out to why are they ghosting me? Why don't they want to catch up with me? They might know a client that you know they might know somebody who might need to work with me. And my answer to that one is well maybe but maybe you don't have the right people in your network.
And so if you're reaching out again in a sequence over strategy manner maybe the reason you're getting ghosted is because you've gone to that strategy you've gone to the outreach too quickly and you haven't stopped to think about who you should be reaching out to. So those are the two things we're dealing with. When I hear people talk about I'm getting ghosted how do I meet people effectively? How do I get people's attention effectively?
The strategies that I hear are assuming a cold outreach is needed and or assuming that the only potential pool of people that we're operating within are people you already know. And when we think in terms of sequence over strategy that's just not true.
So let's first talk about how we want to be meeting people well and what are those foundational pieces that can be in place before you even go to reach out to somebody in order to give you the best chance of success of meeting them. So number one is know who you should be meeting especially when it comes to referrals. If you are hoping to gain referrals from someone I need you to really think through who is that person who is likely to have those.
Because if we're not following sequence over strategy what most often happens is the situation I described a little earlier where you're just looking around and seeing who you know in your network or you're just looking around and hoping you know hop into a coffee chat of some sort that is going to lead to a referral. And that's not how we do it. We actually want to think about something that I call ideal connection avatars.
And ideal connection avatars are a similar concept to your client persona or your ideal client avatar. They're just connections instead of clients. And by connections I mean who are the people that you should be connected to because there is a likelihood that you can form win-wins and that you will find ways to help each other. And those are your ideal connection avatars. And if you haven't thought about that then it becomes harder to meet the right people because now you're just reaching out to anybody and you haven't really put a lot of thought into hey who is a natural person where if I do reach out they're gonna see a natural win-win we're gonna get excited there's a reason for us to connect beyond just being a nice person. And when there's a good reason to connect guess what people connect more often because they understand why they're doing it.
So that's number one. I want you to know who you should be meeting. Think about who's working with your clients right before or right after at the same time as you. And therefore it would make sense for you all to be collaborating. That's number one. Know who your ideal connection avatars are. And I talk about this a ton in my networking that pays course. It is also in my free training that's on my website about how to build a network that pays. It's all right there so if you want to know more about ideal connection avatars check out those resources.
And then number two I want you to have a good reason to meet them. And we're gonna talk about ways to build a good reason to meet them in a minute. But it's important to note you don't want to just say hi I'm Michelle want to grab some time to chat? No nobody does. Nobody has time for that. So you want to have a good reason to meet them and a good refresher on this is even the episode right before us about because statements and the importance of giving folks a reason.
So again we'll talk about what these reasons can look like in a minute but that's what we want to do. We want to a know who you should be meeting, have a good reason to meet them, and then don't assume that you will meet them through some version of cold outreach. That might seem obvious but many people assume it's gonna have to be cold outreach. We just don't want that. We want to find a better reason to meet them.
So let's start getting into the tactics and let's talk about once you know who you should be meeting what are the best ways to meet them? What are the best ways to make this happen? And I'm gonna describe these in the order of ROI. I've been working on helping people meet the right people for 5-10 years now. So I've seen this over and over and over again and while I wish I had hard numbers for you I can tell you through client experience that this is the order that is most successful.
The best way to meet people, and this isn't going to be available to you all the time, but the best way to meet people if it is available to you is via an introduction through a mutual connection. And that's again why it's important to spend some time on your network and be thinking strategically about who should be in your network because the more strategically you think through those ideal connection avatars the more likely it is that you are going to have a mutual connection with the people that you need to meet.
So that's number one is to find a way to have a mutual introduction. That's always going to be your most successful way to get people's attention. But again it's not always going to be available to you. And that's okay because we have other strategies. Second most effective strategy is to create some sort of project. And I know that sounds vague so let me talk you through some examples.
A project just means that before you ask people for something, right, may I have some time from you, I want to chat, I want to blah blah blah, first you do something to offer them a platform. What do I mean by that? I mean do you have a podcast? Invite them to be a guest. A lot of times we write white papers where you can ask folks and reach out to the folks that you want to meet and you can reach out and say I am writing this paper I would love to interview you because I know you have expertise in the area. And I will tell you a story about how I happened upon this strategy.
It goes back to when I had a social impact tech startup and I was really struggling to connect to the people I needed to meet in order to meet my clients. But I was in a situation where I could book just about any keynote. I was in this really unique situation and I acknowledge not everyone is in this situation but I was faced with a reality that I could book just about any keynote in my industry because I had some media buzz around me but I couldn't get anyone to buy anything because I couldn't find a way to connect to my clients. And so what did I do? I used this project strategy and I started turning down the keynotes and instead I said may I get a panel. And I took that panel discussion and I invited everybody that I was trying to meet who was blowing me off. I invited them. I said come to this prestigious conference. Come tell your story.
People want to hear your story. These happened to be people from local governments and nonprofits like folks who really value being able to tell their story. And so they saw a lot of value in that. And so I handed them a platform first. I allowed them to shine and I said I have this asset that I want to share with you. Come join me. Come speak on this panel. There was no ask. There was no other than you know come join me and let me give you this gift. There was no big thing that they had to do. They didn't feel like I was trying to sell them. I said come I'm giving you space to talk. And so if you can create an opportunity like that it takes a lot of pressure off of the initial meeting.
So again I don't want you to create a podcast just to do this because that's a lot of work. But if you already do have a podcast and you do interview people well use that as a way of meeting people.
Start thinking about your guests through the lens of who do I need to meet and invite them to be on the podcast. Or again if you're a corporate consultant can you write a white paper of some sort where you can reach out to the folks in the C-suites that you're trying to meet and say I'm interviewing folks for this paper. Would you participate? Or maybe you can organize a panel discussion. Or you can even reach out and do a blog post. Now I don't want you to do one of those blog roundups where you just reach out to a thousand people asking them all to send you one line. That doesn't build a relationship. But you can pick five people you really want to meet and reach out to them and let them know what you're writing and ask them to participate. Or I've had folks do a small LinkedIn live series.
That's nowhere near the commitment of a podcast right but it gives you an opportunity to invite people to something. To create a project that hands people a platform. And that is a fantastic way to meet people because you're giving so much value. So that's our second one.
Again we're going in order of the most effective ways to meet folks. Number one mutual connection in getting an introduction from a mutual connection. Number two creating some sort of project so that you can hand a platform to folks. Number three is for folks who are going to be posting online in some way. They have some sort of visible public persona. And for these people you can thank them. And I talk about this again. I talk about this a lot in my free training for networking that pays.
So if you want to check that out from the home page of my website I get into this in a lot more detail. But we talk about the thank you. And what the thank you is is it is reaching out to someone if you have read their material or if you have seen them posting about things. And not saying oh gosh I needed to hear this today. But instead reaching out in a very specific way. Sending them a DM or sending them an email if you have it. And saying hey I have seen you writing about you know insert topic that you've seen them writing about. And then share an insight that you've had about it. And if you have tried something of theirs and you have implemented it with great success please share that. But you don't even have to wait and do that. What you can do is just tell them that they have had an impact with you in some way. I receive these notes.
I talk about them a lot so it's probably not surprising that I receive them. But they're very sticky right. Someone will reach out to me on LinkedIn and will say hey I heard a recent podcast of yours and they'll tell me which episode. And thank you for so much for sharing it. Here was my takeaway from that.
And let me tell you guys you know my LinkedIn messages we've all seen them. It's full of connection requests and generic pitches and people who are just trying to connect with you for no reason. And so when you send a specific message like that it sticks out like a sore thumb in a positive way. Because nobody else is putting in any effort right. Everybody else is kind of doing the bare minimum just trying to increase follower counts. So if you do the opposite and you stop and you actually thank somebody for something that they did. Because listen all this content we put out we're not doing it for our health. We actually want to help people. And so if you reach out and you say hey thank you Michelle I heard your podcast episode about how to meet people and it had never occurred to me to create a project in order to do that. Thank you.
This week I'm going to get organized around writing a white paper with a goal of meeting these people. That's gonna make my day and I'm gonna remember that because you've told me something specific that you got out of this. And it is amazing if you've ever experienced this you probably know the same thing but it's amazing how that sticks with you. In a way that there is just so much noise that when you get something specific you remember it. And so what have you done as the person doing the outreach at that point? Well I'm gonna reply to that and I'm gonna say something you know oh thank you so much that means so much to me.
And so I've now opened the door to you trying to build a relationship with me right. We're going in ROI order so it's not as easy as you getting a mutual introduction but it still works it still opens that door and allows you to walk through it and build a relationship with someone. So again when we're talking about the most effective ways to meet people number one is that mutual connection who can make an introduction for you. Number two is creating a project of some sort and number three is sending people a thank you. And that thank you obviously works if they are publishing publicly. It's gonna be a little harder if you're trying to meet somebody who's maybe within a corporate structure and you have nothing to thank them for.
That's gonna be a little bit harder and that's a real thing but maybe then you could create a project for that person right. But these are the order of things that we have available to us in order to try to meet someone in such a way that they're actually gonna pay attention. And then once we get past these three you know those three are the very far leaders in the clubhouse those are your three best bets.
But your fourth bet is to do cold but purposeful outreach. And what I mean by this is this is kind of where everybody starts the conversation of hey Michelle how can I reach out to someone and have them pay attention I know it's gonna have to be cold outreach. Okay well at least you're thinking about how to do cold outreach in a good way.
My first answer is gonna be well can you get introduced or create a project or go thank them. But if none of those are on the table for whatever reason then you can do cold but purposeful outreach and look for a really meaningful because statement.
Why? When you reach out to them don't just say hi I've been following you for a while or hi I'd like to connect. Give them a reason. Give them the reason that you would like to connect. And with any luck maybe that is a little bit of a thank-you note. But you want to think about that because statement and again if you're not familiar with because statements go to the episode right before this one I talk about them in depth. But you want to give people a reason that you are reaching out and a reason beyond you know because I need your help or because I want referrals from you. You want to give them a reason that some way that connects the two of you. And then your absolute last option which you should never use because you can always use cold but purposeful outreach. You can always always always find some sort of because statement to attach to that because the last option is just generic cold outreach. And that's never gonna work. At least not if you want to be consistently meeting quality folks. And so I'm gonna put it on the list because it exists as an option but it is as low as it can get for me. Mostly because cold but purposeful outreach is always available to you. And frankly projects and thank yous are always available to you as well. So again let's talk about that in order.
If you want to meet people that you have identified you should be meeting right? Remember sequence over strategy. Our first step is that we want to know who we should be meeting and be thinking through who's that ideal connection avatar. Once you know that the best ways to meet them in order of success are gaining a mutual introduction, creating some sort of project, sending a thank you in particular if there are somebody who is speaking or publishing publicly, and then a cold but purposeful outreach which is a cold outreach that has a really strong because statement attached to it. And again run over to the previous episode if you're not familiar with because statements. And then your last option that you should really never touch is doing that cold outreach. And then once you've done that now you have an opportunity again to kind of build the relationship.
Before we wrap this up I would love to talk through just a couple of tips on how to make these things a little bit more specific and special and sticky frankly. Because again when you're telling me someone's ghosted you it's because you're probably trying to reach out to get referrals or to build some sort of collaborative relationship and it's not sticking.
So let's talk about how to make these things stick a little bit more. And we'll go in order again of the strategies and in terms of how well they work. So let's look at how to pull off that introduction and that mutual connection because a couple of things can happen here.
Even though that is our most successful strategy you can still screw it up in a way that makes success less likely. Because what happens when you ask for a connection? What happens is you kind of take the power out of your own hands and you are counting on your mutual connection to make that introduction in a way that makes people want to connect with you.
And sometimes that is not the best idea because sometimes people are busy not sometimes all the time people are busy. And so what are folks liable to do if you ask for an introduction and you just leave it at that? They're liable to send like a really generic email that just says Sally meet Sue. Sue meet Sally. Have at it. You two probably could get to know each other. Okay that gives me no incentive to make it happen. Right? If I'm the person who has received that introduction notice it just is another thing on my to-do list. It's generic. There's no because statement around it. And so what you can do when you ask somebody for an introduction I want you to make it as easy as possible on them.
Don't ask them to come up with a bunch of copy on their own because then they're never gonna get around to it. But also don't leave them to their own devices to make this happen. You can say thank you so much for agreeing to make this introduction. I have found that it goes really well if this is what you say about me. So I'm just gonna shoot you a quick paragraph of how to introduce me and use it or don't but that will make your life a little bit easier. 99% of the time they're gonna use that.
And now you have the opportunity to coach not even to coach but to just give them the talk track that they're gonna use in order to introduce you. So instead of just something generic of Sue meet Sally I think you guys might enjoy each other's company or something awkward like that. You have the opportunity to have this person send a message that says hey Sue you know I really think you should meet Sally because and explain why. Explain why it is a benefit. Explain why there's a win-win here for you two connecting because then the person on the receiving end of that connection is going to pay more attention to it. They're gonna get around to it because we've put an enticing reason in there. And so that's something that you really want to do.
You also want to ask for introductions as specifically as possible because once you're starting to create ideal connection avatars it's really easy to reach out to people and say hey I'm trying to meet people who look like this or who are in this role. And what happens when you do that? Well when you do that you make it harder on the person who's gonna make the introductions because what do they have to do?
They have to stop and think if they know anybody who fits that profile. So instead in an ideal world you're gonna be really specific and you are gonna say hey I am pretty sure you know insert some names that you know or insert roles right I'm pretty sure you know the head of HR at X company. Would you mind introducing me to that person? Don't say hey I'm looking for heads of HR. Do you happen to know any? Again you're giving them homework when you do that. Instead say I think you know these two people. Would you mind introducing me?
Be as specific as possible. You may not always know those names right but you probably know some companies you're interested in. You can get specific in giving those folks homework who are gonna make introductions for you and the more specific you can be with your request the easier it is for them to fulfill because then they can just sit down and do it instead of having to think through right. As soon as you say I'm looking for this type of person. Do you know anyone? Now you have asked them to sit there for five minutes and think through whether they know anyone who meets that profile. And when you do that the likelihood of it happening goes down. So we just want to make it as easy as possible for folks. Same deal with projects.
If you are reaching out to ask somebody to participate in a project don't say I am writing a white paper and I really need to interview you and get some information. Okay that sounds generic. Write to them. Tell them why you are reaching out to them. Because you are in this unique position. Because I see you speaking about this. Because of the years of experience you have. Give them a reason as to why their voice is important in terms of whatever project you're trying to create. That is going to get them to act more.
Again I cannot stress enough the importance of having kind of because statements and reasons. So go back and listen to the episode right before this one if you haven't. Because when you're reaching out for that project a lot of times the project in and of itself is enticing enough. But you don't want to take that chance. So you want to say because you are this person or because of whatever I am reaching out to you and would love your advice or would love your input or would love you to participate in this. And that's going to increase your chances of getting a yes. And as soon as you get a yes and as soon as they participate in the project that's your end to start the relationship. Same deal with the thank yous. We talked about this.
If you are reaching out to somebody with a thank you it is not oh thank you I needed to hear that today. It is thank you for saying this because you said it. I had this aha and I'm going to do this. Right? You are telling them very specific things that you're going to do with that information. And that's how we make that one work. And then when they come back again you have now been given an opportunity. You've been given an in to walk through that door and build a relationship with them. And that's how we do it to make people not ghost you and to get people to pay attention. And I hope throughout this episode you have seen that difference.
When we are just reaching out in generic ways or when we are reaching out to anybody that we know hoping that you know if we have a little chat we'll figure out a way to help each other or we can say at the end oh sure I'll send folks your way or oh sure I'll send folks that way. We all do that because it makes us feel better but we all also know it's probably gonna go nowhere. And that's why people ghost. It's because they have a sense it's gonna go nowhere because you haven't given them any indication that your conversation is going to be any different from any of the other outreaches that they see in their inbox day to day. So give them a reason.
Show them why it's gonna be different. And you show them it's gonna be different by A again making sure you're reaching out to the right people by doing some ideal connection avatar work. And B by making sure you're reaching out and you're starting that introduction in a way that is built to be successful and that is built to honor the relationship. And that's it. Are you gonna get a hundred percent hit rate this way? Of course not. Nothing in life is a hundred percent when another human being is involved. But you're gonna have a lot better chance than if you just assume that you're gonna have to do cold outreach to people that you already know and hope something comes of it. That is not a strategy, right?
Just saying I'm gonna reach out and set up 10 coffee chats to people I already know and hope something comes out of it. That is not a strategy. That is a setup to get ghosted. But if you say gosh I've done some work and I know I need to meet these types of people because we will probably find win-wins and I'm gonna meet them in these specific ways. Gosh that's gonna be a whole lot more successful than anything that you have done that is more on that generic side.
So my friends with that, I am going to invite you to head out there, do some Ideal Connection Avatar work, think through who you should be meeting, who might be able to introduce you, and go try to make an introduction happen this week.
And then write me and tell me about it in a specific way. Practice. Send me a thank-you note. I would love to hear about it.
And as a final reminder when you're going out and reaching people, what is that order that you want to go through?
First, you want to look for a mutual connection. And if you find that mutual connection, you want to coach that person on how to make that introduction.
Second, you're gonna look to see is there some sort of project that you can create that hands a platform to these folks so that when you reach out it's with a generous gift.
Third, can you send a specific thank-you and letting them know the impact that they've had.
And then fourth, if you have to look at cold outreach, can you make sure that there's a really strong because statement behind it so that it can be as successful as it can.
Again, it's certainly not gonna be perfect. It's fourth and final on our list, but let's at least give it a chance. Alright, head out there, connect. I'll be back here in two weeks with a new episode. And in the meantime, I would love to hear from you if you have gone out and connected with someone. See you next time.